Mobil Selective Dewaxing process, zeolite catalysts

MIDW [Mobil isomerization dewaxing] A petroleum refining process which improves yield and quality by isomerizing and selectively cracking paraffins in waxy oils. The catalyst is a noble metal, supported on a zeolite. Developed by Mobil Corporation from 1991 to 1996. 

The Mobil process for catalytic dewaxing by selective hydrocracking of wax molecules arose from that company s development work on zeolites and the discovery of the remarkable selectivity exhibited by these catalysts some 20 years prior to first commercialization. In 1960 Weise and Frilette, of the then Socony Mobil Research and Development Laboratories,1 reported that n-decane cracked readily to lighter paraffins over the sodium form of a zeolite known as 13X, whereas the bulkier molecules, a-pinene and isopropylbenzene, underwent no reaction (Figure 10.1). 

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